Bunny Breckinridge
Encyclopedia
John Cabell "Bunny" Breckinridge (August 6, 1903 – November 5, 1996) was an America
n actor
and drag queen
, best known for his role as "The Ruler" in Ed Wood's film Plan 9 from Outer Space
, his only film appearance.
family, the great-great-great-grandson of U.S. Attorney General John Breckinridge
(and the great-grandson of both U.S. Vice President and Confederate
general John C. Breckinridge
and Wells Fargo Bank founder Lloyd Tevis
). He spent time at Eton College
and Oxford University in England
.
In 1927, while working as a drag/burlesque
entertainer in Paris, he married a woman said to be French
royalty. They divorce
d two years later, but had one daughter, named Solange.
Openly gay
at a time when it was daring (and even dangerous) to be so, he was well known for his flamboyant lifestyle, his outrageous sense of humor, and his penchant for perfume and costume jewelry. He performed in Shakespearean plays in England
before moving to San Francisco in the late 1920s. He also frequently performed in drag.
, and Breckinridge expressed many times his desire to undergo the procedure. With the nationwide attention given to Christine Jorgensen
's sex change in 1952, Breckinridge became more determined than ever to become a woman. In 1954, he announced plans to travel to Denmark
and undergo the operation so he could marry his male secretary. Though Breckinridge was by this time a grandfather, his granddaughter supported him in his efforts. Shortly thereafter, a San Francisco judge scuttled his Denmark trip by ordering him into court for failing to make good on an earlier agreement to pay $8,500 a year to support his elderly, blind
mother in England
. He then made arrangements with a sex-change surgeon in Mexico
, but got into a terrible car accident en route. He gave up his pursuit of the matter afterwards.
In 1955, he was arrested in a San Francisco waterfront bar and charged with "vagrancy
" — a then-common excuse to bring charges against homosexuals caught cruising for sex — and jailed, though the charges were later dropped because of his family and wealth
.
), directed by his friend, Ed Wood. Wood and Breckinridge were introduced to one another by their mutual friend Paul Marco
, who played Kelton the Cop in three Wood films.
Breckinridge and Marco were living together in the latter's modest home at the time, despite the fact that he was a struggling B-movie
actor and Breckinridge was an independently wealthy socialite
. David Demering, who played the airplane co-pilot in the film, also lived with them.
Breckinridge's previous stage experience convinced Wood to cast him as the alien ruler who oversees an attempt to take over the Earth using an army of reanimated corpses. Indeed, his background made him one of the few truly experienced actors in the entire cast. Dressed in a pajama-like outfit which is curiously less ornate than those worn by his underlings, he sports very visible mascara and lipstick, and constantly rolls his eyes and mugs for the camera.
In 1959, shortly after Plan 9 From Outer Spaces disappointing release, Breckinridge was convicted on ten counts of "sex perversion" for taking two underage boys on an excursion to Las Vegas
. He was committed to the Atascadero State Hospital
for the Criminally Insane, and released the following year. Upon his release, he returned to his San Francisco home, a Spanish
style bungalow adorned with gold framed photographs of the many celebrities he met and befriended, including Princess Margaret, Noel Coward
, J. Edgar Hoover
, Elvis Presley
, and Ed Sullivan
. Breckinridge frequently opened his home to members of the growing hippie
movement, who were enthralled not only by his stories of his flamboyant youth, but also his favorable opinions on free love
and his encyclopedic knowledge of both gay history and the lives of closeted
Hollywood stars.
By the 1970s, Plan 9 from Outer Space
had amassed a cult following
among B-movie
buffs as the "worst film ever made", making Breckinridge's name known to a new generation. Meanwhile, he returned to stage acting, appearing mostly in local productions in San Francisco.
In 1994, Breckinridge was surprised to find himself portrayed as a character in a major motion picture, played by Bill Murray
in Tim Burton
's 1994 biopic Ed Wood. His advanced years and failing health, however, prevented him from participating in any of the publicity
surrounding the film.
Breckinridge maintained homes on each coast - one in New Jersey
and one in San Francisco - until his death in 1996 at age 93, in a Monterey
hospital. He was quoted in his obituary
as saying, "I was a little bit wild when I was young, darling, but I lived my life grandly."
United States
The United States of America is a federal constitutional republic comprising fifty states and a federal district...
n actor
Actor
An actor is a person who acts in a dramatic production and who works in film, television, theatre, or radio in that capacity...
and drag queen
Drag queen
A drag queen is a man who dresses, and usually acts, like a caricature woman often for the purpose of entertaining. There are many kinds of drag artists and they vary greatly, from professionals who have starred in films to people who just try it once. Drag queens also vary by class and culture and...
, best known for his role as "The Ruler" in Ed Wood's film Plan 9 from Outer Space
Plan 9 from Outer Space
Plan 9 from Outer Space is a 1959 science fiction film written and directed by Edward D. Wood, Jr. The film features Gregory Walcott, Mona McKinnon, Tor Johnson and Maila "Vampira" Nurmi...
, his only film appearance.
Early life
Breckinridge was born in Paris, France to a wealthy CaliforniaCalifornia
California is a state located on the West Coast of the United States. It is by far the most populous U.S. state, and the third-largest by land area...
family, the great-great-great-grandson of U.S. Attorney General John Breckinridge
John Breckinridge (1760-1806)
John Breckinridge was a United States Senator and Attorney General. He was the progenitor of the Breckinridge political family.-Early Life in Virginia:...
(and the great-grandson of both U.S. Vice President and Confederate
Confederate States of America
The Confederate States of America was a government set up from 1861 to 1865 by 11 Southern slave states of the United States of America that had declared their secession from the U.S...
general John C. Breckinridge
John C. Breckinridge
John Cabell Breckinridge was an American lawyer and politician. He served as a U.S. Representative and U.S. Senator from Kentucky and was the 14th Vice President of the United States , to date the youngest vice president in U.S...
and Wells Fargo Bank founder Lloyd Tevis
Lloyd Tevis
Lloyd Tevis was a banker and capitalist who served as president of Wells Fargo & Company from 1872 to 1892.-Early life:...
). He spent time at Eton College
Eton College
Eton College, often referred to simply as Eton, is a British independent school for boys aged 13 to 18. It was founded in 1440 by King Henry VI as "The King's College of Our Lady of Eton besides Wyndsor"....
and Oxford University in England
England
England is a country that is part of the United Kingdom. It shares land borders with Scotland to the north and Wales to the west; the Irish Sea is to the north west, the Celtic Sea to the south west, with the North Sea to the east and the English Channel to the south separating it from continental...
.
In 1927, while working as a drag/burlesque
American burlesque
American Burlesque is a genre of variety show. Derived from elements of Victorian burlesque, music hall and minstrel shows, burlesque shows in America became popular in the 1860s and evolved to feature ribald comedy and female striptease...
entertainer in Paris, he married a woman said to be French
French people
The French are a nation that share a common French culture and speak the French language as a mother tongue. Historically, the French population are descended from peoples of Celtic, Latin and Germanic origin, and are today a mixture of several ethnic groups...
royalty. They divorce
Divorce
Divorce is the final termination of a marital union, canceling the legal duties and responsibilities of marriage and dissolving the bonds of matrimony between the parties...
d two years later, but had one daughter, named Solange.
Openly gay
Gay
Gay is a word that refers to a homosexual person, especially a homosexual male. For homosexual women the specific term is "lesbian"....
at a time when it was daring (and even dangerous) to be so, he was well known for his flamboyant lifestyle, his outrageous sense of humor, and his penchant for perfume and costume jewelry. He performed in Shakespearean plays in England
England
England is a country that is part of the United Kingdom. It shares land borders with Scotland to the north and Wales to the west; the Irish Sea is to the north west, the Celtic Sea to the south west, with the North Sea to the east and the English Channel to the south separating it from continental...
before moving to San Francisco in the late 1920s. He also frequently performed in drag.
Gender identity
In the 1940s, male-to-female sex change operations were becoming more widely available in EuropeEurope
Europe is, by convention, one of the world's seven continents. Comprising the westernmost peninsula of Eurasia, Europe is generally 'divided' from Asia to its east by the watershed divides of the Ural and Caucasus Mountains, the Ural River, the Caspian and Black Seas, and the waterways connecting...
, and Breckinridge expressed many times his desire to undergo the procedure. With the nationwide attention given to Christine Jorgensen
Christine Jorgensen
Christine Jorgensen was the first widely known person to have sex reassignment surgery—in this case, male to female.-Early life:...
's sex change in 1952, Breckinridge became more determined than ever to become a woman. In 1954, he announced plans to travel to Denmark
Denmark
Denmark is a Scandinavian country in Northern Europe. The countries of Denmark and Greenland, as well as the Faroe Islands, constitute the Kingdom of Denmark . It is the southernmost of the Nordic countries, southwest of Sweden and south of Norway, and bordered to the south by Germany. Denmark...
and undergo the operation so he could marry his male secretary. Though Breckinridge was by this time a grandfather, his granddaughter supported him in his efforts. Shortly thereafter, a San Francisco judge scuttled his Denmark trip by ordering him into court for failing to make good on an earlier agreement to pay $8,500 a year to support his elderly, blind
Blindness
Blindness is the condition of lacking visual perception due to physiological or neurological factors.Various scales have been developed to describe the extent of vision loss and define blindness...
mother in England
England
England is a country that is part of the United Kingdom. It shares land borders with Scotland to the north and Wales to the west; the Irish Sea is to the north west, the Celtic Sea to the south west, with the North Sea to the east and the English Channel to the south separating it from continental...
. He then made arrangements with a sex-change surgeon in Mexico
Mexico
The United Mexican States , commonly known as Mexico , is a federal constitutional republic in North America. It is bordered on the north by the United States; on the south and west by the Pacific Ocean; on the southeast by Guatemala, Belize, and the Caribbean Sea; and on the east by the Gulf of...
, but got into a terrible car accident en route. He gave up his pursuit of the matter afterwards.
In 1955, he was arrested in a San Francisco waterfront bar and charged with "vagrancy
Vagrancy (people)
A vagrant is a person in poverty, who wanders from place to place without a home or regular employment or income.-Definition:A vagrant is "a person without a settled home or regular work who wanders from place to place and lives by begging;" vagrancy is the condition of such persons.-History:In...
" — a then-common excuse to bring charges against homosexuals caught cruising for sex — and jailed, though the charges were later dropped because of his family and wealth
Wealth
Wealth is the abundance of valuable resources or material possessions. The word wealth is derived from the old English wela, which is from an Indo-European word stem...
.
Plan 9 from Outer Space
In 1958, Breckinridge agreed to play the role of an alien leader in the film Graverobbers from Outer Space (later retitled Plan 9 from Outer SpacePlan 9 from Outer Space
Plan 9 from Outer Space is a 1959 science fiction film written and directed by Edward D. Wood, Jr. The film features Gregory Walcott, Mona McKinnon, Tor Johnson and Maila "Vampira" Nurmi...
), directed by his friend, Ed Wood. Wood and Breckinridge were introduced to one another by their mutual friend Paul Marco
Paul Marco
Paul Marco was an American actor who often appeared in movies made by Ed Wood, including the "Kelton Trilogy" of Bride of the Monster, Night of the Ghouls and Plan 9 from Outer Space, in which he played a bumbling, fearful policeman named Kelton.-Career:Born in Los Angeles, Marco started taking...
, who played Kelton the Cop in three Wood films.
Breckinridge and Marco were living together in the latter's modest home at the time, despite the fact that he was a struggling B-movie
B-movie
A B movie is a low-budget commercial motion picture that is not definitively an arthouse or pornographic film. In its original usage, during the Golden Age of Hollywood, the term more precisely identified a film intended for distribution as the less-publicized, bottom half of a double feature....
actor and Breckinridge was an independently wealthy socialite
Socialite
A socialite is a person who participates in social activities and spends a significant amount of time entertaining and being entertained at fashionable upper-class events....
. David Demering, who played the airplane co-pilot in the film, also lived with them.
Breckinridge's previous stage experience convinced Wood to cast him as the alien ruler who oversees an attempt to take over the Earth using an army of reanimated corpses. Indeed, his background made him one of the few truly experienced actors in the entire cast. Dressed in a pajama-like outfit which is curiously less ornate than those worn by his underlings, he sports very visible mascara and lipstick, and constantly rolls his eyes and mugs for the camera.
In 1959, shortly after Plan 9 From Outer Spaces disappointing release, Breckinridge was convicted on ten counts of "sex perversion" for taking two underage boys on an excursion to Las Vegas
Las Vegas Strip
The Las Vegas Strip is an approximately stretch of Las Vegas Boulevard in Clark County, Nevada; adjacent to, but outside the city limits of Las Vegas proper. The Strip lies within the unincorporated townships of Paradise and Winchester...
. He was committed to the Atascadero State Hospital
Atascadero State Hospital
Atascadero State Hospital is located on the central coast of California, in San Luis Obispo County, half-way between Los Angeles and San Francisco. It is an all-male, maximum-security facility, that has patients from all over the state...
for the Criminally Insane, and released the following year. Upon his release, he returned to his San Francisco home, a Spanish
Spain
Spain , officially the Kingdom of Spain languages]] under the European Charter for Regional or Minority Languages. In each of these, Spain's official name is as follows:;;;;;;), is a country and member state of the European Union located in southwestern Europe on the Iberian Peninsula...
style bungalow adorned with gold framed photographs of the many celebrities he met and befriended, including Princess Margaret, Noel Coward
Noël Coward
Sir Noël Peirce Coward was an English playwright, composer, director, actor and singer, known for his wit, flamboyance, and what Time magazine called "a sense of personal style, a combination of cheek and chic, pose and poise".Born in Teddington, a suburb of London, Coward attended a dance academy...
, J. Edgar Hoover
J. Edgar Hoover
John Edgar Hoover was the first Director of the Federal Bureau of Investigation of the United States. Appointed director of the Bureau of Investigation—predecessor to the FBI—in 1924, he was instrumental in founding the FBI in 1935, where he remained director until his death in 1972...
, Elvis Presley
Elvis Presley
Elvis Aaron Presley was one of the most popular American singers of the 20th century. A cultural icon, he is widely known by the single name Elvis. He is often referred to as the "King of Rock and Roll" or simply "the King"....
, and Ed Sullivan
Ed Sullivan
Edward Vincent "Ed" Sullivan was an American entertainment writer and television host, best known as the presenter of the TV variety show The Ed Sullivan Show. The show was broadcast from 1948 to 1971 , which made it one of the longest-running variety shows in U.S...
. Breckinridge frequently opened his home to members of the growing hippie
Hippie
The hippie subculture was originally a youth movement that arose in the United States during the mid-1960s and spread to other countries around the world. The etymology of the term 'hippie' is from hipster, and was initially used to describe beatniks who had moved into San Francisco's...
movement, who were enthralled not only by his stories of his flamboyant youth, but also his favorable opinions on free love
Free love
The term free love has been used to describe a social movement that rejects marriage, which is seen as a form of social bondage. The Free Love movement’s initial goal was to separate the state from sexual matters such as marriage, birth control, and adultery...
and his encyclopedic knowledge of both gay history and the lives of closeted
The Closet
The Closet may refer to:* The Closet , Chinese film* The Closet , French film* The closet, referring to undisclosed homosexuality- See also :* Closet* Closet * In the closet...
Hollywood stars.
Later years
Breckinridge continued his theatrical career throughout the 1950s, but in small local productions, such as playing the role of The Inquisitor in Richard Bailey's production of The Lark in Carmel.By the 1970s, Plan 9 from Outer Space
Plan 9 from Outer Space
Plan 9 from Outer Space is a 1959 science fiction film written and directed by Edward D. Wood, Jr. The film features Gregory Walcott, Mona McKinnon, Tor Johnson and Maila "Vampira" Nurmi...
had amassed a cult following
Cult following
A cult following is a group of fans who are highly dedicated to a specific area of pop culture. A film, book, band, or video game, among other things, will be said to have a cult following when it has a small but very passionate fan base...
among B-movie
B-movie
A B movie is a low-budget commercial motion picture that is not definitively an arthouse or pornographic film. In its original usage, during the Golden Age of Hollywood, the term more precisely identified a film intended for distribution as the less-publicized, bottom half of a double feature....
buffs as the "worst film ever made", making Breckinridge's name known to a new generation. Meanwhile, he returned to stage acting, appearing mostly in local productions in San Francisco.
In 1994, Breckinridge was surprised to find himself portrayed as a character in a major motion picture, played by Bill Murray
Bill Murray
William James "Bill" Murray is an American actor and comedian. He first gained national exposure on Saturday Night Live in which he earned an Emmy Award and later went on to star in a number of critically and commercially successful comedic films, including Caddyshack , Ghostbusters , and...
in Tim Burton
Tim Burton
Timothy William "Tim" Burton is an American film director, film producer, writer and artist. He is famous for dark, quirky-themed movies such as Beetlejuice, Edward Scissorhands, The Nightmare Before Christmas, Ed Wood, Sleepy Hollow, Corpse Bride and Sweeney Todd: The Demon Barber of Fleet...
's 1994 biopic Ed Wood. His advanced years and failing health, however, prevented him from participating in any of the publicity
Publicity
Publicity is the deliberate attempt to manage the public's perception of a subject. The subjects of publicity include people , goods and services, organizations of all kinds, and works of art or entertainment.From a marketing perspective, publicity is one component of promotion which is one...
surrounding the film.
Breckinridge maintained homes on each coast - one in New Jersey
New Jersey
New Jersey is a state in the Northeastern and Middle Atlantic regions of the United States. , its population was 8,791,894. It is bordered on the north and east by the state of New York, on the southeast and south by the Atlantic Ocean, on the west by Pennsylvania and on the southwest by Delaware...
and one in San Francisco - until his death in 1996 at age 93, in a Monterey
Monterey, California
The City of Monterey in Monterey County is located on Monterey Bay along the Pacific coast in Central California. Monterey lies at an elevation of 26 feet above sea level. As of the 2010 census, the city population was 27,810. Monterey is of historical importance because it was the capital of...
hospital. He was quoted in his obituary
Obituary
An obituary is a news article that reports the recent death of a person, typically along with an account of the person's life and information about the upcoming funeral. In large cities and larger newspapers, obituaries are written only for people considered significant...
as saying, "I was a little bit wild when I was young, darling, but I lived my life grandly."